Phil Schiller rightfully said the 2012 rMBP was the "gold standard" of laptops back then: it was light, thin, powerful and had a decent battery life. He is quite wrong when he said that the new rMBP is the "new gold standard". Apple's competitors have learned and managed to release devices that are lighter, thinner, more powerful and have a longer battery life. The only thing that sets the new rMBP apart is the new Touch Bar, but as impressive some of the demonstrations were, I'm not convinced if is isn't more of a hassle than actually useful. We'll see.

Apart from that, the specifications aren't impressive: no 4k display (not even optionally), which actually makes the rMBP one of the HiDPI laptops with the lowest resolution. "Just" 10 hours battery life (probably under unrealistic conditions, as usual). Just 16 GB RAM. Disappointing GPUs – both the integrated and the dedicated ones, with the only optionally available Radeon 460 being just acceptable. No more MagSafe. No more SD slot (which I often use). At least it has 4 Thunderbolt ports, even though the switch to USB C only will make it a adapter nightmare (although I have to say in all fairness, that Apple's Thunderbolt 2 to 3 adapter is actually the cheapest of its kind I've seen so far). And the new trackpad is simply huge.

I still ordered one, since this will probably the last time I can buy a new laptop with my university discount.

"We do what we must, because we can."
"Gaming on a Mac is like women on the internet." — "Highly common and totally awesome?"

The move to only Thunderbolt 3/USB C is one that I cheer from the perspective of one watching the industry; but also one that I mourn as one who will probably be using this machine regularly in the near future. If the day comes where every single port/cable uses USB C then it will be a glorious day, but until then we have to go through the pain of adapters.

The touch bar looks like something that is extremely useful, as it is so easily accessible without having to move your fingers off of the keyboard. Relies on developer support though.

Graphics wise the Intel Iris 540/550 are quite impressive for integrated chips, but obviously not competing with mid-range discrete options. The "Radeon Pro" 450 and 460 are interesting. I'm assuming they are roughly performance equivalent to the desktop 450 and 460 which isn't bad, but not amazing. The beauty of thunderbolt 3 though is that we will most-likely be able to use external graphics adapters in the very near future.

We reached the end of rapid innovation in laptops years ago. This is the product of 4 years of innovation, and even then there isn't much to show for it. Sure they could have chosen a slightly higher res screen, or a slightly faster GPU (GTX 1060) but 99% of users will never notice the absence of those things in the real world. They didn't leave anything out that I can think that they should have added.

Janichsan, on 27 October 2016 - 01:51 PM, said:

I have correct you here: the "budget" option is actually also a completely new device, but with a slower CPU, slower GPU, less ports (only two TB3 instead of four) and without the Touch Bar.

I mean the 'real' budget option which was previously a unibody 2012 13" MacBook Pro with a superdrive. Scroll down on the their MacBook Pro page. It is down there. Goes for the pleb price of $1300 USD vs $1500 USD for the other 'budget option'.

I bought the 13" but will be living on ramen for the rest of the year. (jk) Wasn't expecting these price hikes (a decently sized 13" even with an EDU discount, is $2k), and they are selling the old models *without* lowering the prices. I really wanted 1 TB, but for $360 more...ugh. 512 should be manageable, though, since I won't be using it for gaming.

Fingers crossed the keyboard doesn't suck. They stressed that the version 2 butterfly has better travel, but The Verge article said it feels essentially the same.

Disappointed that I will not get more screen real estate on a computer that is six years newer. Magsafe is sad but the advantages of USB C power outweigh them (although surely Apple could've figured out how to add a magnet in there??)

Now to find a good TB3 dock that will charge these things and output to 4k...it's obvious they consider that expensive monitor a "dock."

I'll type up more later but my general impression is, the updates are fine, there's some cool stuff. I really appreciate the extra work Apple does for accessibility. Continuing focus on thinness that their professional customers are not asking for, and the average consumers have ultraportable low power options like the MacBook already. It really feels like this stuff should be 2-300 less across the board and Tim looked at IBMs reported savings from JNUC and decided Apple was leaving money on the table.

Storage costs are insane, especially at the volume Apple is buying NAND.

No mention of desktop was very disappointing, yet plenty of time to focus on the TV app. Roku has had these features for years. The Apple UI is a little more polished but there's nothing here I haven't been doing for years with Roku, and I'm not about to replace an in house fleet of Roku and Roku TVs without something majorly impressive.

Agree with snakysnek that they didn't really leave out anything I'd want added but they didn't add anything that justifies $300+ price increases.

I mean the 'real' budget option which was previously a unibody 2012 13" MacBook Pro with a superdrive. Scroll down on the their MacBook Pro page. It is down there. Goes for the pleb price of $1300 USD vs $1500 USD for the other 'budget option'.

Ah, yes. I missed that.

"We do what we must, because we can."
"Gaming on a Mac is like women on the internet." — "Highly common and totally awesome?"

Only things I wish my late 2013 rMBP had were a more powerful processor option and a real GPU. Apple addressed neither of these things and made the 13" rMBP thinner and put a gimmick bar on it. Apple's new fancy pants touch bar $1800 13" rMBP is still below the min sys reqs for Civ IV, with only a 2 core i5 vs the required 4 core i5.

I like magsafe and the SD card slot as well, but I could live without those for a good GPU. Nope. Thinner. Because the existing rMBP line up is like lugging around a cinder block.

Pros- Option of Radeon Pro 450, 455, or 460 (70% more performance on a 35W chip! Love this!)
- Better display
- Thunderbolt 3. Only a year late

Cons
- Touch Bar or gimmick bar. I always want one step access to mute/volume no matter what I am doing. Don't want UI shortcuts that have to look down at the keyboard.
- No more MagSafe 2 (and HDMI, & SDXC). Looking to next time my power cable is tripped on and breaks.
- No 11" form. There was 11" Air for $899. Now smallest is 13" for $1499 (Macs without Thunderbolt don't count)
- No Apple 4K or 5K display. They suggest LG Ultrafine display. They make awesome displays built-in but won't make a display?
- No innovation. Where is the TB3 external graphics option? Or the 5GBase-T ethernet?

- Touch Bar or gimmick bar. I always want one step access to mute/volume no matter what I am doing. Don't want UI shortcuts that have to look down at the keyboard.
- No Apple 4K or 5K display. They suggest LG Ultrafine display. They make awesome displays built-in but won't make a display?
- No innovation. Where is the TB3 external graphics option? Or the 5GBase-T ethernet?

The Touch Bar almost always displays the Control Strip (ha, so retro) which is customizable and can contain volume and brightness controls. And it only hides it temporarily when you specifically invoke something, like selecting a color or (cringe) pick an emoji.
Apple worked with LG on the new displays, so they are clearly out of the business. Pros: Cheaper. Cons: Ugly

For some reason I don't think Apple is interested in external graphics (or graphics in general). I'd love to be wrong, though.

BTW, the reports I've seen of Civ VI performance are pretty good. I have a feeling the new 13" Pro will be able to handle it, despite not being quad core.

The new machines are okay. (16GB RAM though-- what?!) The bar looks fun, but is unavailable for most of Apple's lineup so I really doubt there will be much adoption by third-party developers. Though, I guess people will write customizeable utilities for it a la USB Overdrive. So guess it'll be adaptable. Still, I was expecting Apple to also announce an expensive Thunderbolt keyboard with the same touch bar on it (plus some ports). As it is, it seems like a gimmick that Apple may abandon in 3-5 years.

I was hoping this Apple event would reassure me about their long term Mac road map, but no such luck. Even if they had just pruned the lineup, that would have been a sign. At least it would indicate that they were paying attention and maybe had an intent to upgrade the models that were left. Right now it all seems pretty lifeless.

We've talked about all this before of course. I don't mean to dredge up that other thread again, just expressing disappointment at today's announcements.

- No 11" form. There was 11" Air for $899. Now smallest is 13" for $1499 (Macs without Thunderbolt don't count)
- No innovation. Where is the TB3 external graphics option? Or the 5GBase-T ethernet?

I think these two things are non-issues.

The 11" was pretty outdated. The screen bezels were massive on it. The 12" Macbook is the same size or smaller, despite having an inch larger display. I'm positive that TB3 external graphics options will be solved by a 3rd party. We don't need an official apple enclosure for this (although it would be nice). 5 Gbps networking is perfectly capable over the thunderbolt connection, so also not an issue.

Think of these machine as shipping with 4 PCIe slots - ready for use by any number of peripherals. This is what is exciting about TB3. It is bringing desktop-class expandability to the notebook